Vuze Petitions FCC To Restrict Traffic Throttling

mrspin writes "Vuze, an online video application that uses the peer-to-peer protocol BitTorrent, has petitioned the U.S. Federal Communications Commission to restrict Internet traffic throttling by Internet Service Providers (ISPs). Vuze has been keenly aware of Comcast and the "bandwidth shaping" issue. Vuze filed its "Petition for Rulemaking" (PDF) to urge the FCC to adopt regulations limiting Internet traffic throttling, a practice by which ISPs block or slow the speed at which Internet content, including video files, can be uploaded or downloaded. As readers may remember, back in May, Slashdot discussed the issue of packet shaping and how ISPs threaten to spoil online video."

Comments

Finally

[JCSoRocks]

I'm glad to see that someone out there is willing to take on Comcast to put an end to this kind of garbage. They may be doing it to protect their product, but the end result is good no matter who you are. Bravo I say!

Re:Finally

[Sloppy]

but the end result is good no matter who you are. Bravo I say!

As much as Comcast sucks, it sounds like you're taking the position that the federal government should have the authority to regulate how networks work. I think that's awful, and endangers just about everyone.

Comcast should be bitchslapped (and probably at the state level) for fraud: they fail to supply what they lead prospective customers to believe they supply. And in states where there are laws against impersonation, that should be enforced as well (or else repealed).

But for feds to regulate-away throttling itself, is a nightmare. Networks need to be able to deal with congestion problems, even in cases where they are not overselling or otherwise engaged in fraud. Throttling large transfers to increase the performance of interactive stuff, is a perfectly sane (and fair) way to do it. FCC better keep out of this.

Also, remember we're talking about feds. Comcast's monopoly, AFAIK, is provided by local governments. That's who should be setting terms. Kicking it it so far up the hierarchy of government, just reduces The People's power in the decision.

Re:Finally

[kcornia]

I think the general reasons for desiring government intervention are twofold. One, no one wants to wait around for all the telcos to get sued and dragged through ten years of civil litigation before a decision is reached. Two, and IANAL or a telco buy, but I think the government has these guys on a leash somewhat because we the taxpayers essentially paid for the creation of the network they're now charging for you, and that money was given based on them being common carriers. The reference to ATT trying to exclude calls to Montgomery county illustrates this perfectly. They are common carrier internet access providers. Deciding what content you're going to provide vs. not provide takes you out of common carrier, or so it's being alleged by many.

That's my understanding anyway, could be completely off base...

Re:Finally

[JCSoRocks]

But for feds to regulate-away throttling itself, is a nightmare.

From what I saw they're only trying to "urge the FCC to adopt regulations limiting Internet traffic throttling," - not do away with it entirely. While I agree that federal control of networks is bad, I also don't see much else happening to bring Comcast to its senses. They ignore consumers (we all know what their "customer service" is like) and they fight like crazy to keep any competition out of their market. At this point I'm just happy to see someone having a go at making their life a little more difficult.

Re:Finally

[clang_jangle]

Actually, if the Feds don't regulate the net then it's the telcos and cablecos who will set policy -- and we can see just how well the whole "free market" foolishness works for everything else (how 'bout that Ivory Coast for example). The thing people seem to miss is the fact that free market means if I want your head for my hood ornament it's just a question of having the money. So while I do have qualms about gov't regulation in general it beats the heck out of the alternative.

Re:Finally

[caffeinemessiah]

Throttling large transfers to increase the performance of interactive stuff, is a perfectly sane (and fair) way to do it.

Perhaps in an earlier paradigm, but there's really a small distinction today between "interactive stuff" and "large transfers". If by the latter you mean file sharing, a lot of the former (e.g. voip, video, etc.) is also using the same p2p technology. In fact, since a lot of p2p traffic, be it interactive or downloading stuff, is encrypted anyway, it's going to be very hard to tell which is legitimately 'interactive' and which is just a large .avi download, i.e. which packets to shape.

It's one reason why these "Vuze" people might have a legitimate case against comcast -- it hurts their "business", whatever that might be.

Re:Finally

[rmerry72]

But for feds to regulate-away throttling itself, is a nightmare. Networks need to be able to deal with congestion problems, even in cases where they are not overselling or otherwise engaged in fraud. Throttling large transfers to increase the performance of interactive stuff, is a perfectly sane (and fair) way to do it.

Hate to use a car or "the internet is just tubes" analogy but there is a parallel with motorways, trains, and any heavily congested resource.

What if motorway companies started with a policy of refusing travel on the motorway for certain types of traffic during peak times? Say:

• trucks only - as they pay three times what a car does?; or
• Only cars with two passengers or more; or
• No sports cars or motor bikes - your all criminals anyway; or
• Only those travelling on legitamate company business - no personal travel

Yes, there are special lanes for some of these cases and they are particularly useful - but they are NOT BLOCKING traffic or sending traffic down a back street to a black hole, or forcing you to go down the "old back route". You've paid your toll and you get to use the road like everybody else for whatever is legal. It just takes longer - and for everybody!

Re:Finally

[PhxBlue]

As much as Comcast sucks, it sounds like you're taking the position that the federal government should have the authority to regulate how networks work.

Wouldn't that be called "net neutrality"?

Re:Finally

[JesseMcDonald]

Two, and IANAL or a telco buy [sic], but I think the government has these guys on a leash somewhat because we the taxpayers essentially paid for the creation of the network they're now charging for you [sic], and that money was given based on them being common carriers.

Comcast (the primary target here) is not a telco. It's trying to move into that market via VoIP, but it never received federal funds to do so; its network and equipment are privately funded and owned, and should remain so. Nationalizing the cable networks via regulation won't solve anything any more than doing the same with the telco's networks solved anything. The real culprits here are the local governments, and to some extent the states, due to their habit of handing out lucrative monopoly franchises and thus killing any possibility of intra-regional competition. Such merchantilist practices must be eliminated before any significant progress can be expected.

Re:Finally

[mikael]

Some friends asked me to burn a number of Linux LiveDVD's so they could compare the different releases. In a single afternoon I downloaded around 16 Gigabytes of data, along with using bittorrent to get the Fedora Core 8 LiveDVD (which didn't seem to be on a downloadable ISO file anywhere).

Re:Finally

[Ogemaniac]

"Comcast should be bitchslapped (and probably at the state level) for fraud: they fail to supply what they lead prospective customers to believe they supply. And in states where there are laws against impersonation, that should be enforced as well (or else repealed)."

Can you point me to the fraudulent advertising? If you believe that subscribing to broadband means "maximum possible bandwith all of the time" then you are an idiot. No one pretends to offer that, and the big ol' words "up to" are in every add ever seen.

Re:Finally

[Shakrai]

erhaps in an earlier paradigm, but there's really a small distinction today between "interactive stuff"

Umm, it's not really that hard. Here's some of my iptables rules:

Flag traffic from my T-Mobile UMA phone:
iptables -t mangle -A POSTROUTING -o eth0 -s 172.25.42.100 -j TMOBILE

Flag TCP ACKs:
iptables -t mangle -A OUTPUT -o eth0 -m length --length 0:52 -p tcp --tcp-flags ALL ACK -j ACKS

Flag SSH and telnet (only small packets so to avoid giving priority to scp transfers):
iptables -t mangle -A OUTPUT -o eth0 -p tcp --sport 22:23 -m length --length 0:200 -j INTERACTIVE

Flag NTP:
iptables -t mangle -A OUTPUT -o eth0 -p udp --sport 123 -j INTERACTIVE
iptables -t mangle -A OUTPUT -o eth0 -p udp --dport 123 -j INTERACTIVE

Flag echos and echo-replies to ensure good ping times:
iptables -t mangle -A OUTPUT -o eth0 -p icmp --icmp-type echo-request -m length --length 0:128 -j INTERACTIVE
iptables -t mangle -A OUTPUT -o eth0 -p icmp --icmp-type echo-reply -m length -- length 0:128 -j INTERACTIVE

All those targets are custom chains that classify the packets with --set-class, but the reality is you could do whatever you want with them. There's also -t mangle POSTROUTING equivs for all of these rules, to classify traffic being forwarded from my LAN.

Now, I don't pretend that the above is a perfect solution. For one it would be open to abuse by somebody that went out of his way to make his bandwidth hogging application match my rules. But it would seem to me that a company with the resources of Comcast and access to routers that can do deep packet inspections could find a way to classify and prioritize most interactive traffic in a such way that wouldn't be disruptive to anyone.

It shouldn't be able throttling a bandwidth heavy application down -- it should be about giving priority to more important traffic. Do you really think a bittorrent user or web surfer is going to notice his download rate drop by 1kb/s because his neighbor is pounding away in that ssh session? He will notice if you rate-limit that one protocol down to some arbitrary number even though the network isn't maxed out.

Re:Finally

[Sloppy]

Actually, if the Feds don't regulate the net then it's the telcos and cablecos who will set policy

You have way more influence over your city council and mayor, than over your congresscritter. If Comcast plays in a way that you don't like, your local government can say, "No monopoly for you."

Re:Finally

[cheater512]

The government should have no say at all about how the networks are run.

They should however restrict how ISPs can screw consumers.
Its a subtle difference. They wouldnt be setting network policies directly, only indirectly.

Re:Finally

[poetmatt]

identity fraud. The way the throttling works they impersonate both the sender and receiver and send both a reset flag impersonated as from the other

Re:Finally

[wdhowellsr]

It's so bizzare that after reading about the lawsuit being filed against Comcast that I install wireless router. I do have Limewire installed but hardly ever use it but after installing the router, there was an obvious increase in network speed. It was kind of freaky as under normal circumstances I would have lost some speed with the new router. I'm not sure if this is evidence of Comcast throttling peer to peer users but it seems pretty strange.

Re:Finally

[macz]

No No No. We don't want the FCC to know that there IS an internet, much less to REGULATE it!

Re:Finally

[Curunir_wolf]

Now if someone could do something about Verizon's port 80 (and 25?) blocks on their FIOS service, I might even have an actual choice for ISPs (even if it is only 2).

Re:Finally

[u-235-sentinel]

Can you point me to the fraudulent advertising? If you believe that subscribing to broadband means "maximum possible bandwith all of the time" then you are an idiot. No one pretends to offer that, and the big ol' words "up to" are in every add ever seen.

Comcast is the id10t for advertising unlimited use for a flat monthly fee. Sure they don't do that anymore. But then again I didn't receive the memo that THEY changed the terms of service when I was a customer.

Some people call it bait and switch.

Someone with standing, ... maybe

[cdrguru]

A Comcast user isn't going to get much traction in trying to sue Comcast over services they were expecting and not receiving. I doubt Comcast has any more legal obligation to deliver "expected" service than Geico has to deliver "an English muffin with butter and jam" - in reference to their commercials.

Now this company might actually have some standing to say their product is being blocked. Unfortunately, I don't think anybody has Comcast (or others) over a barrel quite yet. Comcast never agreed to deliver this content, or any other specific content. What did they agree to deliver? Probably not much, and nothing specifically. You aren't guaranteed email, web browsing, VPN or any other service. They didn't define what services they are delivering, what quantities of these services or anything else.

I think the company already looked at suing Comcast and found out there isn't anything there. The only avenue would be rulemaking or legislation. Probably not much going to happen there either.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[moderatorrater]

Actually, the issue isn't blocking or throttling, it's sending packets telling you to disconnect from the sender, and these packets are constructed by comcast to look like they're coming from the peer you're downloading from. Since it's a fraudulent packet, they could get in trouble for that. I'm sure straight-up throttling would be less of an issue, although in that instance they're not living up to their speed claims on purpose. I guess the real problem is that Comcast promised more bandwidth than they could deliver, and now that customers are trying to use it, Comcast is in a bit of a bind.

I will say this about Comcast, they're a hell of a lot better than Cox.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[cromar]

Of course, there are the upload/download rates you are supposed to get. Otherwise, why pay for 10Mbps when they can just give you 1bps. It is a clear cut case of fraud. You pay for one thing and get another. If it's not one speed for every protocol, it's not any speed at all: it's simply their whim.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[AndersOSU]

They didn't define what services they are delivering, what quantities of these services or anything else.

Isn't it precisely the FCC's role to step in and say, "By being a telecom company offering a product labeled as Internet access, you must provide the following:..."

ATT couldn't get away with saying that calls to Montgomery county aren't included in phone service, Comcast shouldn't be able to get away with saying bit torrent isn't included in internet service.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[farkus888]

I think this is a better way to attack this, someone who is hosting legal bittorrent files needs to step up and sue comcast for forgery. there is no reason why creating a fake packet with my mac and ip and sending it to someone to cause them to drop my connection should be legally treated any differently than making a fake check with my banks watermark and my signature and using it to get a teller to give you my money. this cognitive disconnect between how the internet and everything else are treated absolutely astounds me.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[faloi]

Now this company might actually have some standing to say their product is being blocked.

Think about the grander scheme though. Vuze comes out discussing Comcast having, essentially, hampered the service for all users of the service. Remember, Comcast isn't throttling the bandwidth, they're shaping packets to drop connections on both ends of the pipe...Comcast customers and non-Comcast customers. If someone that participated in a service with, oh...let's say 9.3 million subscribers with each individual being able to prove that Comcast is likely to be impairing their ability to use a service provided by a third party... Vuze probably isn't suing because they don't have the revenue to sustain a lawsuit. Other companies do.

It would be in Comcast's best interest to stop now. Since that's not likely, it'll be interesting to see what some intelligent lobbying and/or lawyering can get done.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[geekoid]

If Gieco sold their insurance with "unlimited English muffins with butter and jam" , they damn well better provide all the muffins and jam I want. Even if it is more then what they want to give away.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[bagboy]

Internet delivery is a non-regulated service - no matter if you are a telecom or not. Most telecom companies have a separate sub-company that deals with non-regulated services, such as internet or voip. Therefore they "MUST" provide nothing more than an access port and other ancillary services as part of your contract (ie, email accounts, dns, etc...) just like you don't have to buy service from them.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[TooMuchToDo]

Easy. Damages. You've lost nothing by them blocking a bittorrent transfer. When real fraud occurs (i.e. fake check), then it matters.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[TooMuchToDo]

Comcast will simply come out and say "Hey, we gave you users a chance. Now, we throttle Australian-ISP style". You'll get unlimited Internet. It'll just be at 6-8Mbps in short bursts, and the rest throttled down to 256kbps.

It comes down to people wanting champagne internet connectivity on a beer budget. Want 10Mbps up and down? Pay for a real internet connection.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[bdjacobson]

I think this is a better way to attack this, someone who is hosting legal bittorrent files needs to step up and sue comcast for forgery. there is no reason why creating a fake packet with my mac and ip and sending it to someone to cause them to drop my connection should be legally treated any differently than making a fake check with my banks watermark and my signature and using it to get a teller to give you my money. this cognitive disconnect between how the internet and everything else are treated absolutely astounds me. Most of the sort of people using bittorrent to host legal content do not have the resources to spend on a lawsuit. If they did they would probably just be hosting the content themselves. With a company like Blizzard, Comcast would have a bit much to lose so they would fight it, which would drive up the cost for Blizzard, and the shareholders would not approve. So Blizzard would just start hosting the content if worst came to worst rather than spend millions on a big lawsuit.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[E 99]

Since it's a fraudulent packet, they could get in trouble for that.

A fraudulent packet? What is a fraudulent packet? Packets, including their IP addresses, are modified in all sorts of ways by routers and software to work the TCP/IP protocol for all sorts of purposes. Are these all fraudulent packets? Or is the problem only that it's an undesired packet? Shall we pass federal legislation outlawing the transmission of any packets that aren't desired by the owner of the endpoint address? A lot of /. posters would be in violation of that law!

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[farkus888]

canonical and or the people who run traditional mirrors of ubuntu have real losses because their bittorrent seeds are being dropped when one end is on comcast. this forces people to either forgo ubuntu where each download is potential future support revenue, or to use one of the mirrors which costs someone bandwith money. remember that those bigger connections often get charged based on bandwith usage to some level even if it is only on overages.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[farkus888]

unfortunately I do understand those economics and it really saddens me. its an absolute shame that a major corporation could do something like this and yet there is no real way that they are going to get proper retribution. all because of money. I do intend to do my part by dropping their internet and tv the day fios is available in my neighborhood, but I know that the profit they make on one person is not even as big as a rounding error in their books. and I seriously doubt there is a huge fanbase of comcast fans on /. that I could be converting with my comments.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[phantomlord]

You aren't paying for 10Mbps. You're paying for a theoretical maximum of 10Mbps, likely with no minimum guaranteed service. If you want a full, unthrottled 10Mbps connection to the internet, look into a pair of T2s. I can guarantee that you'll be paying more than $40/month though.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[rossz]

Geico includes muffins and jam!?

Damn, I should have gone with Geico. :(

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[Curunir_wolf]

Courts don't recognize what might have happened. Your not getting a $100.00 payment from someone can't be parlayed into a $1,000,000.00 payment in court because you could have bought a hot stock with that $100.00 early on. You're stuck collecting what you would get plus any statutory damages.

Interesting. So you're saying that if some company, say, a record label, sues a person that potentially caused them loss of revenue by, for instance, posting their songs on the Internet, they would only get actual proven damages? Whew! That's a relief. Here I was afraid that they could walk into court and get a jury award for something like $200,000 by saying that a bunch of people *might* have downloaded the songs that otherwise *might* have actually paid for them.

Thanks for straightening me out.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[gd2shoe]

I doubt Comcast has any more legal obligation to deliver "expected" service than Geico has to deliver "an English muffin with butter and jam"

Wrong, sorry. Geico was extremly careful to include a disclaimer in the add. Specifically the gecko stating "that's a complete dramatization of course, but you get my point" (from memory). Comcast has not disclaimed unusual limitations to what they claim is Internet access. Geico is not AS obligated as Comcast.
(Legally speaking, we have yet to see just how obligated Comcast is. By all standards of decency they are being quite rude.)

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[jimsum]

Why does everyone call these reset packets forged? If the reset packet didn't have the right source and destination information, it wouldn't work. Basically a reset packet is like all TCP packets; it has fields typically called source IP address and port, destination address and port, and a protocol code. If you want to end a connection, you send a reset packet to a destination address and specify the connection to reset using the rest of the address fields. Does the "source" information specify the sender of a reset packet, or does it specify which connection to reset? Typically, it is assumed that the source address originated the packet; but that is just an assumption, not a legal requirement.

Is it forgery when OpenOffice writes a file in .DOC format? After all, some unsuspecting person or program might be defrauded into thinking the .DOC file came from Microsoft Word.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[u-235-sentinel]

ISP's have every right to throttle, limit, block traffic as they so desire. As either a method of protecting their user base or ensuring a quality of service.

You might want to complain to the FCC about that as they have stated that ISP's are required to provide certain things as part of the ISP's service to you the customer. Which doesn't allow for limiting or blocking traffic as they desire.

The link has been posted here several times.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[u-235-sentinel]

Comcast will simply come out and say "Hey, we gave you users a chance. Now, we throttle Australian-ISP style". You'll get unlimited Internet. It'll just be at 6-8Mbps in short bursts, and the rest throttled down to 256kbps.

It comes down to people wanting champagne internet connectivity on a beer budget. Want 10Mbps up and down? Pay for a real internet connection.

It's interesting you mention this. Other countries including Australia provide faster speeds at a fraction of the prices here in America.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[fwr]

Are you retarded or what? You write like you might know what you are talking about, but obviously you don't. A TCP connection is a combination of the source and destination IP address and the source and destination TCP port. That is why two people can telnet to the same server and the same port. The two clients send packets to the same IP address and the same port. So are they the same connection? No. And if you spoof (forge) my source address you can mess up my connection if you do it right. You would be impersonating me and could tell the server to close my connection. This is essentially what Comcast is doing with bit torrent traffic. No, I don't think you're retarded, just trolling. Feel free to mark this flamebait; the parent post was stupid enough for me to take the karma hit.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[fwr]

Mod parent up. He said it better than I possibly could.

Re:Someone with standing, ... maybe

[jimsum]

I was trying to show there are two ways to interpret a reset message. Commonly, it is taken to mean "end MY connection"; but I think it simply means "end THAT connection". In both cases, the RESET packet is a command to a specific endpoint to end a specific connection (that may be one of many). The question here is who may legitimately send a command to end a connection; whether only the participants of the connection can send the command, or if an outside third party is allowed to send the command. At least one type of packet, the SYN packet, can be sent by an endpoint that is not part of a connection (since the connection hasn't been established yet); who says RESET isn't another TCP packet that can be sent from outside a connection?

A router or firewall is capable of crafting ("forging") a RESET message from standard, unencrypted parts of the TCP/IP header, just by passively observing the traffic in the connection. Those routers and firewalls are completely entitled to examine the headers; in fact they must, in order to perform their functions. Comcast is using standard information to craft a standard-compliant RESET packet and send it to an endpoint as part of a legal traffic management operation. Is it really illegal to simply use a protocol in a way not anticipated by the original designers? Comcast isn't the only company using this technique.

Authority

[omeomi]

Does the FCC have the authority to restrict throttling? I thought wired communications, like cable TV, were largely out of their control?

Re:Authority

[teebob21]

Are you serious or trying to be funny?? The FCC is the regulatory body for basically all telecommunications; thus Federal Communications Commission. Anybody who's in the communications business in the US is the FCC's bitch. Especially cable TV, with Kevin Martin currently wearing the FCC jester's hat.

The top paragraph of this page pretty much sums it up: All your base are belong to us^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H "The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent United States government agency, directly responsible to Congress. The FCC was established by the Communications Act of 1934 and is charged with regulating interstate and international communications by radio, television, wire, satellite and cable. The FCC's jurisdiction covers the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and U.S. possessions."

Re:Authority

[omeomi]

Are you serious or trying to be funny??

I'm not trying to be funny, I'm asking a question. There's clearly some difference, since the FCC can regulate content on broadcast TV and Radio, and can fine broadcasters hundreds of thousands of dollars for a nipple slip during the Super Bowl, but cable stations like HBO and Cinemax can show all the nipples they want. Not to mention the internet. So they don't have complete ability to control *everything* when it comes to communications. My question is do they have the authority / jurisdiction to regulate this?

Re:Authority

[fwr]

Now you are trying to be funny. It was just quoted to you exactly what they have jurisdiction over, to include WIRE. Cable television is made from WIRE. They certainly do have jurisdiction over cable. That they allow nipples on HBO and Cinemax is more of a grand fathering in left over from when cable was not ubiquitous. That and the fact that you actually have to pay for service, for which you do not for radio transmissions (directly). Since you are paying for it it is assumed that you know what you are paying for. If you're really that lazy, here's another quote from the FCC site:

Congress recognized the importance of broadband in Section 706 of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, which directs the FCC to "encourage the deployment on a reasonable and timely basis of advanced telecommunications capability to all Americans." The Commission's goals are to:

        * Broaden the deployment of broadband technologies
        * Define broadband to include any platform capable of transmitting high-bandwidth intensive services
        * Ensure harmonized regulatory treatment of competing broadband services
        * Encourage and facilitate an environment that stimulates investment and innovation in broadband technologies and services.

Tell 'Em

[cromar]

You can have my bandwidth when you pry it from my cold, dead hands.

Is anyone else amused...

[Anonymous Coward]

that this company thinks that this company thinks that removing P2P throttling will help streaming video?

And yes, I did RTFA and saw that they're delivering streaming media via the bittorent protocol. I say it's they're own damn fault for using a protocol which is well known for huge bandwidth use and no latency requirements to deliver media with critical latency requirements. If you don't want the ISPs messing with your video stream try not making your video stream look like a file download.

Re:Is anyone else amused...

[Clay Pigeon -TPF-VS-]

The question is more along the lines of 'why should it be fine for them to mess with file downloads but not streaming video?'

Re:Is anyone else amused...

[kcornia]

How about the telcos not worry about being an arbiter of what traffic is ok and what traffic isn't. The latency argument is a red herring. Internet providers, let the law worry about copyright infringement and quit using it to cover the fact that you've oversold your bandwidth now that more than a minority of your customers want to use everything you guaranteed.

Re:Is anyone else amused...

[Ilgaz]

that this company thinks that this company thinks that removing P2P throttling will help streaming video?

And yes, I did RTFA and saw that they're delivering streaming media via the bittorent protocol. I say it's they're own damn fault for using a protocol which is well known for huge bandwidth use and no latency requirements to deliver media with critical latency requirements. If you don't want the ISPs messing with your video stream try not making your video stream look like a file download. Actually some numbers of companies managed to do such P2P sharing for streaming audiow/video years ago and they are still doing it. It didn't break down anything and in fact actualy helped ISPs since a truely popular live Radio would have to hit 3-4 very high bandwidth IPs and distributed locally.

For example Octoshape is endorsed/used by Deutsche Welle TV, EBU
http://www.octoshape.com/about/octoshape.asp

I am all for actual, pure UDP streaming with auto fallback such as Quicktime, Real but... People choose to download/stream(!) over HTTP.

Re:Is anyone else amused...

[logicpaw]

The question is more along the lines of 'why should it be fine for them to mess with file downloads but not streaming video?'

They're businesses. They probably figured out how to extract more profits from video watchers on average at a lower infrastructure cost (maybe customer retention plus video advertising revenues versus symmetric provisioning costs, or some such...)

Re:Is anyone else amused...

[kcornia]

I didn't say P2P, I said traffic. They sold me 5MBs of bandwidth. Not 5MBs of bandwidth except for bittorrent. They're trying to change the contract after the fact by adding the asterisk and trying to use the smokescreen of "bittorrent is bad because pirates use it" to cover up the fact that they oversold their goods, AGAIN (remember this problem when cable modem first came out and they oversold in many neighborhoods, causing it to be slower than dial up during peak hours?).

Who is Vuze? Well...

[Anonymous Coward]

Vuze would be the Azureus guys.

Now remove the tag that prominently displays your inability to use Google, you apes.

I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[jdjbuffalo]

Vuze is correct in thinking that protocols and the Internet connections as a whole shouldn't be throttled, in theory, however in practice ISPs are limited in how much available bandwidth they have. As much as I don't like it, there is often a requirement that ISPs throttle some of the more bandwidth intensive protocols so that everyone on their network can have an enjoyable Internet experience.

Now, ideally, I think that the ISPs should be actively lighting up lots of new fiber between each other (peering) and lines out of their DSLAMs and Headends but it does take time and as we all know, since they are profit driven, they need to be making lots of money to keep their investors happy.

Lastly, there is a difference between throttling (normal for most ISPs) and what Comcast is doing, actively blocking/sabotage. Comcast deserves to get smacked down hard for what they are doing.

Re:I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[Chirs]

"As much as I don't like it, there is often a requirement that ISPs throttle some of the more bandwidth intensive protocols so that everyone on their network can have an enjoyable Internet experience."

I know...how about they just make people pay for the bandwidth they use?

They could offer X GB/month packages, where bigger X means bigger monthly fees. They could even get fancy and say that traffic between the hours of 1am and 7am doesn't count, or counts less.

There are all sorts of ways for them to ensure they don't lose money while still giving unfettered access.

Re:I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[Wesley Felter]

there is often a requirement that ISPs throttle some of the more bandwidth intensive protocols so that everyone on their network can have an enjoyable Internet experience.

No; ISPs could throttle the bandwidth-hogging customers while remaining ignorant of protocols.

Re:I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[Volante3192]

Vuze is correct in thinking that protocols and the Internet connections as a whole shouldn't be throttled, in theory, however in practice ISPs are limited in how much available bandwidth they have.

This practice is countered by the ISP's willingness to advertize bandwidth WELL in excess of what they have. Perhaps ISPs should just use real numbers, not mythical ones some marketing genius picked out of a hat.

It's the same with airlines and overbooking. It should just be illegal to sell more than you can reasonably provide.

Re:I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[PhantomHarlock]

It's definitely an imperfect solution to a complicated problem. As a previous poster put it:

Also, remember we're talking about feds. Comcast's monopoly, AFAIK, is provided by local governments. That's who should be setting terms. Kicking it it so far up the hierarchy of government, just reduces The People's power in the decision.

The root issue here is the 'last mile' problem. A bunch of competing cable and phone providers would result a mass and tangle of wire going everywhere. A government enforced monopoly (which is what we have) is not much better, but it's more aesthetic. What we really need is a proliferation of secure wireless based services, much like how satellite TV competes with cable TV. Unfortunately, consumer grade satellite internet has horrible latency and other problems. I think the answer is some type of cellular or mesh solution. Some companies use long range wifi and other directional antenna based systems, and mesh networks are pretty awesome if you can get enough people to participate. There also needs to be enough competition among all of these services to foster innovation. So more than one wireless provider for any given service area.

Again we run up against the FCC, which allocates wireless frequency spectrums here in the US. There is a lot of artificial and real scarcity - with the most innovation happening on the unlicensed bands (2.4ghz and it's multiple 5.8 ghz).

Internet connectivity (fiber optic) as a public utility is interesting - but only if it is done on a local level. Anything bigger than that, say, statewide, is bound to become mismanaged and horrible. (just think of the DMV...)

Comcast is just trying to protect its bandwidth, but as the parent poster mentions, the way they are doing is potentially dubious.

Also, to correct a misnomer from another post, their principal purpose is not to -stream- video via torrent (although they are now experimenting with that using their internal player) but to allow downloads of very large video files that people then watch locally.

I am a Vuze / Azureus user and so far this is the only good solution I've found for hosting my legal original HD videos on the web short of running a legal torrent server myself, which wouldn't get as much exposure. Vuze has also set up a system where you can sell downloadable video content for a price if you wish, a boon to indepdendent video producers.

Some things that they have done recently have been aggrivating (re-compressing files to a semi-proprietary format) but on the whole they have the right idea. And they are the textbook example of a company that is the most hurt by bandwidth throttling if it is done to an extreme as Comcast is doing (completely denying a download session)

Unlike Comcast itself, Vuze provides an outlet for speciality video producers to get their stuff out there.

Re:I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[Kazrath]

I really do not like the available bandwidth argument. 15 years ago there was no home based broadband and the argument was still being made that there was not enough bandwidth. A decade ago AOL lost a HUGE suit over it.

These companies are holding a monopoly and raking in the cash. If you take into account just the internet sector has something like 13 million subscribers that 650 million gross a month. Their cable TV pretty much uses the same bandwidth also. Why are they not investing their huge profits into infrastructure to improve their maximum bandwidth. The technology is already avaialable so there is no valid excuse. If you increase your bandwidth to a point that it is impossible to saturate it then the issues will go away. Basically if everyone can download High Def content faster than you can play it the network cannot be saturated.

Re:I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[jdjbuffalo]

I agree that they should be held more accountable for actually providing the service that they purport to have. I would be fine with reigning them in just so long as we all don't end up going from being able to get 15 mbps most of the time to 3 mbps all the time.

Re:I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[TooMuchToDo]

Amen. I would pay Comcast extra to do this.

Re:I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[jdjbuffalo]

I agree that is what they should be doing; buildouts to the point of never having to worry about saturating their lines.

We should definitely be pushing hard to have them do this despite the large capital expenditures. The thing is this kind of investment only happens with the correct prodding. The way this happens in a Capitalist-like society (we're not true Capitalists) is by having lots of companies competing in an area for business. There are only a handful of these areas in the country because of local monopolies on wiring and competition. In those areas, like New York, where you have two cable companies, Verizon FiOS and others there is a lot of options. This ensures that the customer should, in theory at least, be getting what's advertised because if they don't they will jump ship. And since companies often times want to be better than their competition they will always be trying to show their service is better (in this case by increasing speeds and delivering on those promises).

What I'm getting at is that if we fix the problem by making sure there is lots of competition then the bandwidth problem is likely to be a lot less of a issue or possibly go away completely . Until we address this on at least a state, if not federal, level then we won't see much serious change.

Re:I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[langelgjm]

with the most innovation happening on the unlicensed bands (2.4ghz and it's multiple 5.8 ghz).

You, sir, have an interesting definition of multiple.

Re:I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[PhantomHarlock]

That's what happens when I post during the afternoon food coma. ;)

Re:I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[eth1]

I think one of the better ways to do this is to sell a package with X GB of unthrottled transfer per month. As you approach X, instead of just letting you blow past it and chargeing for the extra bits, start throttling the sustained transfer speed down while leaving short bursts unthrottled.

You can pay more to increase X, but there's no fear of getting cut off or ending up with a large bandwidth bill to make people wary of buying a 'limited' or 'metered' service.

The huge bandwidth users will either have to pay more or deal with slow downloads, while the "normal" users don't have to worry about it at all. If they do go over one month, their web browsing and MMORPGs aren't affected, and they don't get hit with a bunch of extra charges. Most people want very fast transfers for a few seconds at a time, and this seems like a perfect solution.

Re:I Agree in Theory but Not In Practice

[dodobh]

You could force last mile unbundling, in return for access rights.

Here's one

[geekoid]

don't sell bandwidth you can't supply... what's that, it would be more expensive? awww shucks.
TFB.

Re:Here's one

[Burdell]

Do you really want to pay $400+/month for a 3 meg guaranteed-bandwidth DSL? I just got a quote for a high-speed link from a "top tier" backbone provider. I can get high-quality backbone bandwidth for about $30/meg/month, but then it costs about the same for the loop to carry that bandwidth to my network facility. Customers expect ISPs to have network redundancy, so to sell that 3 meg DSL I have to pay $360/month for 3 meg of Internet bandwidth to two backbones. I also have to pay the telco for the DSL loop, somewhere between $15 and $40 (depending on speed, location, and telco). Oh yeah, and I have to buy routers, servers, spares, and pay support/maintenance costs for all of the above. It'd also be good to pay the employees, and there's not much incentive to sell this if I don't at least make a small amount of profit on each customer.

Even if you oversell the redundant Internet connection to 100%, you are looking at over $200 in fixed costs per customer to guarantee 3 meg (not including the ISP infrastructure, employees, and any profit).

One Thing leads to Another

[Silentknyght]

(1) FCC gets petition to prohibit bandwidth throttling
(2) all bandwidth is "unthrottled"
(3) all (at least US-based) ISPs have lack-of-bandwidth issues
(4a) all ISPs revoke any claim to "unlimited bandwidth" in a revised agreement notice upon which you have no say, and begin charging per-kb.
(4b) all ISPs actually perform the service upgrades for which they were already paid years ago.

Methinks that if 1 leads to 2, then it leads to 4a. 4b is there just for giggles. They'll never actually do that, of course.

Re:One Thing leads to Another

[Volante3192]

I doubt 3'll happen without 4b happening first...

Re:One Thing leads to Another

[noidentity]

(1) FCC gets petition to prohibit bandwidth throttling
(2) all bandwidth is "unthrottled"
(3) all (at least US-based) ISPs have lack-of-bandwidth issues
(4a) all ISPs revoke any claim to "unlimited bandwidth" in a revised agreement notice upon which you have no say, and begin charging per-kb.
(4b) all ISPs actually perform the service upgrades for which they were already paid years ago.
Methinks that if 1 leads to 2, then it leads to 4a. 4b is there just for giggles. They'll never actually do that, of course.

If ISPs go from (0) (falsely advertise bandwidth) to (4a), then that opens the way for the market to choose reward the few ISPs that choose (4b).

Tag system

[Wylfing]

Completely off-topic, but what the deuce is going on with tags lately? To the adjectives absurdly long, meaningless, and obscure, now we can add obscene.

Re:Tag system

[PhxBlue]

Completely off-topic, but what the deuce is going on with tags lately? To the adjectives absurdly long, meaningless, and obscure, now we can add obscene.

You got a fuckin' problem with that? :)

</Bronx>

Re:Tag system

[Ilgaz]

I think I did the neccesary feedback via turning them off. It is turned off at

http://slashdot.org/users.pl?op=edittags (must be logged in of course).

I think if enough (99%) turns them off, CmdrTaco would remove that junk "Web 2.0" feature. There are some serious offensive tags I saw especially personal attacks to not-so-loved authors. Now marking every Anti Apple story as "FUD" is something, personal attacks are much more serious things which would degrade image of Slashdot and may even create legal trouble.

Re:Tag system

[illumin8]

Completely off-topic, but what the deuce is going on with tags lately? To the adjectives absurdly long, meaningless, and obscure, now we can add obscene.

In case anyone is wondering what Vuze actually is (based on the obscene tag, I guess a few are), this is a company started by the developers of Azureus, the popular Bittorent client on Sourceforge. It's basically a new version of Azureus that hides all of the "technical" bittorent junk behind a media player interface. I think they're trying to make money off of it somehow.

Re:Tag system

[stinerman]

Yeah, they don't add anything to the discussion. They're just a way to post an opinion to the front page.

Re:Tag system

[PhantomHarlock]

The tags are the moral equivalent to wikipedia defacing. They are amusing, and you knew it was going to happen. //reads them for the humor value

How should get what bandwidth/priority

[pcause]

The truth is that all ISPs rely on the fact that if they are selling 5Mbps t 10 people they don't have to have 50Mbps of available backbone. They assume that web applications are using the connections intermittently or that if you have a long running connection it doesn't matter if it slows down from time to time. If everyone on their 5Mpbs lines was downloading large files the best they'd each get would be something like 500Kbps assuming a 10-1 contention rate and most ISPs are are 20-1 or 50-1.
P2P traffic will slow down if there is a lot of it or if there is other long running traffic, without Comcast doing anything.

The bigger issue is that our connections are a shared resource. I it fair for you to get all of the bandwidth and leave me with slower response for my web traffic just because you want to download movies. Should we all get an equal slice. The only way for the ISP to do this is traffic shape - limiting the amount of total available bandwidth available for high use protocols like P2P traffic. Ding this means that when I try to load my web page or shoot a dragon in my MMOG there is some bandwidth left to give me a decent response.

Now, you could say that all the ISPs should have enough backbone to supply each of us with full time use of the bandwidth that the ISP talks about providing. The problem is that this would cost a HUGE amount of money and your bill would up 10-50 times what you now pay (depending on your ISPs contention factor).

The so called "net neutrality" debate is mis-named. The question is who pays for the cost of infrastructure and who makes the profits?

Re:How should get what bandwidth/priority

[Stray7Xi]

Ok because you want faster service for your web/mmo traffic some other traffic should never get any bandwidth? More bandwidth isn't the crux of the problem even if it would solve the problem. They can throttle P2P without blocking it. Instead they decided to kill all connections.

In the end they just need to give SLA's with a minimum guaranteed bandwidth and also additional burst capability based on network load. Sure it may be something like 256Kbps guaranteed 12Mbps burst which would really make them look bad but right now if you're unable to use the connection you're effectively at 0bps and thats the same whether the network is under load or not.

Re:How should get what bandwidth/priority

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Now, you could say that all the ISPs should have enough backbone to supply each of us with full time use of the bandwidth that the ISP talks about providing.

Nope. ISPs should, however, be required to advertise what they're actually offering rather than misleading potential customers.

The problem is that this would cost a HUGE amount of money and your bill would up 10-50 times what you now pay (depending on your ISPs contention factor).

Please. Comcast does not charge cost plus a markup for service. They charge what maximized profit because in many locations they have a government enforced monopoly and because their infrastructure was subsidized by our tax dollars to the tune of billions. They don't compete because no one else can get access to the last mile public right of ways needed to lay lines and because the government won't shell out billions more to establish a second player and won't require Comcast share the lines with competitors.

The so called "net neutrality" debate is mis-named.

Net neutrality is a different issue altogether, despite propaganda trying to confuse the topic. Net neutrality is simply advocating a law that says ISPs can't treat traffic differently depending upon the source and destination of the traffic. That is to say, they can throttle all bittorrent traffic, but they can't throttle all bittorrent traffic except traffic to a service they are offering or service to a company they get paid extra by.

The question is who pays for the cost of infrastructure and who makes the profits?

The entrenched telecos make the profits, because their lobbying dollars are more influential than the threat to politicians posed by the chance that voters will be informed of how new laws affect them and vote on the issue. The infrastructure has already been paid for largely by the US taxpayer. In fact, we've already paid more per person than Sweden, which has similar population density and who subsidized the entire infrastructure and have much more widespread coverage. They have faster speeds and pay a fraction of what we do. This is despite a huge misappropriation scandal there. That means in the US we pay more monthly. after having paid more in taxes, and we have a significantly inferior system. What does that tell you aside from the fact that telecos in the US are more greedy and our government is significantly more corrupt.

Finally, we have granted these big companies immunity from prosecution for breaking a huge number of laws like copyright violation, child pornography laws, libel and slander laws, etc. We grant them this protection under the guise of their being "common carriers" but many of them are not officially bound by the restrictions we place on other common carriers. Instead they have all the benefits of common carriers, but eschew the responsibility (to carry all traffic impartially without censorship or discrimination). It is clear to me that our current laws and the way these companies operate is not in the interests of the people, but only in the interests of milking as much money as possible. If we can publicize what is happening and get people to care about how far the US is falling behind other industrialized nations, maybe we can see some real improvement and move back to the top 10 internet enabled countries in the world, where we need to be if we hope to salvage our economy.

Re:How should get what bandwidth/priority

[Ilgaz]

Yes, there is no guaranteed bandwidth so those companies still buy "real" T1, T3 lines.

I wonder one thing. How come those ISPs aren't hurt by millions of people actually streaming/downloading flv files over HTTP, the protocol every "real" media player falls back as last resort?

ISPs have something deeper against P2P technology and its becoming household item via legal distributors such as Vuze, Bittorrent(.com) etc.

In fact, lets say one day a hit movie ships legally online exact same time as cinemas. It is released as, Apple iTunes store (non P2P) and Vuze/Bittorrent. Guess which will choke down the ISP bandwidth? Apple one! As the content is really popular, more than 1 person at same time will download it and will keep it sharing in same IP block. ISPs even setup Tucows/Open source mirrors to get rid of outside traffic. Vuze/Azureus guys ship everything down to 100kb plugins over Bittorrent protocol and guess what? Nobody hits their servers at all. Most of the time, you end up downloading from your own IP block.

This has something to do with ties with large media companies, loss of major bandwidth/hosting contracts and even political control.

Re:How should get what bandwidth/priority

[cdrguru]

It has nothing whatsoever to do with common carrier. It is called DMCA Safe Harbor provisions.

A whole different thing that any sort of "common carrier" status.

Re:How should get what bandwidth/priority

[MulluskO]

Seems like they're taking a page from the banker's textbook.

Re:How should get what bandwidth/priority

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

It has nothing whatsoever to do with common carrier. It is called DMCA Safe Harbor provisions.

The DMCA regards the distribution of tools that can be used to bypass encryption based DRM on copyrighted materials. The safe harbor provision mostly apply to online publishers hosting content, not ISPs. The DMCA does not grant ISPs the right to make and distribute copies of copyrighted works, like every time they transmit a copy of a Web page from router to router to an eventual client.

Re:How should get what bandwidth/priority

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

ISPs are not, and never have been, common carriers.

Legally, ones that are also regular voice carriers are. Those that aren't are still granted most of the privileges under the law, but not the same legal restrictions. This is because they paid a lot of money to various political campaigns and it paid off.

Fair trade

[davidwr]

The courts, Congress, or a federal agency has the following responsibilities:

• Prevent fraudulent advertising
  
• Prevent unfair trade - if you throttle traffic because of some justifiable reason like bandwidth utilization, you must throttle all traffic on equal terms including your own. If you offer phone or video services you cannot give them preferential treatment.
  
• No discrimination based on the content of the data. A bit is a bit is a bit.
  
• No discrimination based on the port or protocol without a valid technical reason. "SSH triggers a bug in our routers that crashes our network" is a valid if very embarrassing technical reason. "SSH lets people hide torrents and torrents are big" is not.
  

What the feds should NOT do:

• Prevent shaping to enforce bandwidth-utilization. I may want to pay for a small bits-per-minute cap. My neighbor may want to pay for a higher cap.
  
• Prevent shaping to offer quality-of-service tiers, provided that any data was eligible to travel on any tier if the customer wants to pay for it. I may want to pay for guaranteed low-latency and throughput of all traffic. My neighbor may want to pay for that service but only for traffic from YouTube.
  

Re:Fair trade

[Shakrai]

Prevent shaping to offer quality-of-service tiers, provided that any data was eligible to travel on any tier if the customer wants to pay for it. I may want to pay for guaranteed low-latency and throughput of all traffic. My neighbor may want to pay for that service but only for traffic from YouTube.

I agreed with everything else you wrote, but I'm somewhat leery of this. Offering different tiers at the ISP level is all well and good -- nobody is suggesting that the 1,500 byte packet from the $29.95/mo residential customer should have priority over the 1,500 byte packet from the $500/mo business customer. In the ideal world they would also give priority to interactive traffic (ssh/telnet packets, ntp packets, TCP ACKs, gaming, voip, etc) regardless of what tier the customer is in, as such traffic tends not to consume very much bandwidth at all and the extra costs to them are nil.

It's when they start talking about having a end-to-end tier'ed internet that I start to have a serious problem with it. My ISP has the right, within reason, to ensure that everybody receives a fair slice of a limited (the last mile) resource. AT&T does not have the right (IMHO) to charge Google, Yahoo or Bob's website extra for the right of ensuring that their packets reach me in a timely manner.

All packets should be treated equally on the internet backbone. And, ideally, barring natural disasters/war/acts of god/equipment failures/etc, QoS on the internet backbone should be a moot point, because the backbone links shouldn't reach 100% utilization.

Re:Fair trade

[E 99]

The courts, Congress, or a federal agency has the following responsibilities: ...
        * Prevent unfair trade - if you throttle traffic because of some justifiable reason like bandwidth utilization, you must throttle all traffic on equal terms including your own. If you offer phone or video services you cannot give them preferential treatment.
        * No discrimination based on the content of the data. A bit is a bit is a bit.
        * No discrimination based on the port or protocol without a valid technical reason. "SSH triggers a bug in our routers that crashes our network" is a valid if very embarrassing technical reason. "SSH lets people hide torrents and torrents are big" is not.

Why on earth should the federal government, or any other government, enforce such a thing. As a Comcast customer it would be a disaster for me. Cable has an inherently limited upstream bandwidth. If Comcast allowed people to run their bittorrent upstreams unimpeded 24/7, I wouldn't have the upstream bandwith available that I need to the make file transfers I need to make for my livelihood as a developer. Other than hurting a business by hurting the majority of its customers, what purpose does it serve. EVERYONE loses from such a policy, except for torrent downloaders who will get them a little faster. Why should the government have the authority to enact measures that don't serve the public good?

The issue isn't throttling... yet

[KWTm]

Actually, the issue isn't blocking or throttling, it's sending packets telling you to disconnect from the sender...

This has been repeated a number of times, and I recognize the truth in this, but you need to remember that the bigger picture is that an ISP is trying to change unilaterally how (and whether) it delivers traffic based on content.

If we all complain, "Comcast is sending RST packets!" and then eventually Comcast says, "Okay, fine, no more RST packets," and then goes on to do other forms of extreme traffic shaping, then what? No, we want to nip this in the bud: no ISP, Comcast or not, should be allowed to unilaterally decide, "Hey, we don't like this traffic, so I just won't carry it." or "This is for The Good Of The People to Prevent Piracy" (or "Prevent Undermining Our Glorious President" or whatever).

Moreover, people need to know the implications of traffic shaping / net neutrality / dearth of ISP competition. I was very frustrated about how BitTorrent has been marginalized as "something that only pirates would use". The more we show the lay public the many versatile uses for a protocol like BitTorrent (or any other protocol, really), the more we get a public response.

Re:The issue isn't throttling... yet

[moderatorrater]

I was very frustrated about how BitTorrent has been marginalized as "something that only pirates would use" I think that we're seeing torrents going the way that encryption did: where at one time it was just the realm of geeks, criminals and spies, now it's used by everyone. Explicit use is still mostly limited to those three groups, but through ssl, wireless, and most vpns, encryption is a daily event for most people.

Likewise, bittorrent was once seen as the realm of pirates, linux geeks and pornographers. While this might still be the case for explicit use, more and more we're seeing it being used by WoW, music services, and automagic patchers. What kind of uproar would this turn into if we told comcast subscribers that their WoW patches are slow because of comcast blocking it?

The public doesn't want to know any more about net neutrality than they want to know about freedom of speech issues for video games. But if you put it in terms that affect them ("Good Lord, they're going to make it impossible to get Zuma!"), you'll get an uproar and enough pressure for comcast to cave.

Re:The issue isn't throttling... yet

[TooMuchToDo]

At the end of the day, it's their network. If you don't want your packets to ride their network, don't use their service. Do you care that they block Microsoft file sharing ports through their network? How about SBC/Yahoo DSL blocking port 25 outbound except to their internal mail servers? In the end, you can always go with a provider who will just give you pipe (Speakeasy), but it's going to cost you a premium (as it should).

Re:The issue isn't throttling... yet

[Mistshadow2k4]

At the end of the day, it's their network.

Not if I'm paying for it -- then the part I'm paying for is mine. It's bullshit excuses like "it's their network/content/whatever" that makes sure that the people paying for it have no rights whatsoever, not even the right to get what they're paying for.

Re:The issue isn't throttling... yet

[TooMuchToDo]

You're paying for the use of their network. It's not yours. No part of it is yours. When you rent a car, you pay for it's use. It. is. not. yours.

Re:The issue isn't throttling... yet

[Silverlancer]

Except the fact that its creation was funded by taxpayer dollars?

Re:The issue isn't throttling... yet

[E 99]

This has been repeated a number of times, and I recognize the truth in this, but you need to remember that the bigger picture is that an ISP is trying to change unilaterally how (and whether) it delivers traffic based on content.

They're not doing anything based on content. They're doing to based on protocol. There's an enormous difference.

no ISP, Comcast or not, should be allowed to unilaterally decide, "Hey, we don't like this traffic, so I just won't carry it." or "This is for The Good Of The People to Prevent Piracy" (or "Prevent Undermining Our Glorious President" or whatever).

A company shouldn't be able to unilaterally decide what product or service it is going to sell? What is this frikin North Korea? Who should decide what the company is going to offer then? President Bush? The Supreme Court? Based on what does anyone other than the company have any right to make that determination?

Re:The issue isn't throttling... yet

[TooMuchToDo]

Really? Because I thought it was Comcast and SBC that paid the huge capital expenditures to lay the copper/fiber. Being granted the right to lay copper/fiber is not the same as getting a fist full of taxpayer dollars.

Re:The issue isn't throttling... yet

[u-235-sentinel]

You're paying for the use of their network. It's not yours. No part of it is yours. When you rent a car, you pay for it's use. It. is. not. yours.

Ahh but with renting a car, if the renter allows you to only drive in residential roads and NOT use the freeway (since we all know freeways are dangerous... they go very very fast), you can choose to go with another company providing similar services.

And in the words of Brian Roberts (Comcast CEO), "We have no Competition".

I agree. DSL is slower and wireless options are even slower. No competition is good... for one side.

Re:The issue isn't throttling... yet

[TooMuchToDo]

Perhaps there's less competition because residential internet is not profitable without a monopoly? I can get 10Mbps up and down for $150 from a wireless provider. I doubt they would be able to provide the same service for $50/month (which is what Comcast charges for 8Mb down and 384k up in my area).

Re:The issue isn't throttling... yet

[Silverlancer]

They were given gigantic subsidies and tax benefits in order to lay that copper.

Re:The issue isn't throttling... yet

[TooMuchToDo]

So are airlines. And nuclear power plants. And my favorite, railroads (you know how many miles of land they were given?).

I've gotten off track though. Tax subsidies and benefits aren't taxpayer money though (although the two are confused often).

Re:Someone with gimmee, ... maybe

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

It may not meet an RFC, but not following standards normally isn't fraud.

Not following standards is not inherently fraud, but that does not mean you cannot commit fraud by intentionally breaking standards.

It may not meet an RFC, but not following standards normally isn't fraud.

Abuse is subjective in this case. If Comcast advertises unlimited use, 24/7 at a given rate and someone tries to actually use that rate 24/7 they are not being abusive, they're trying to get their money's worth.

Re:Someone with gimmee, ... maybe

[Volante3192]

As lawsuits have shown, actual technical knowledge seems to be disregarded.

Frankly, if they're advertising 1.5M, I should see 1.5M. Not 256, not 512, not 56, and not 1.4. This is false advertising. If they have bandwidth problems, they should Advertize What They Have. This reminds me a lot of the EPA Estimated Mileage fiasco where they had to retune the numbers. Tell people what they get in REALITY. I'd rather have a guarenteed 256K than a 256K masquerading as a 1.5M

Re:Someone with gimmee, ... maybe

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Anyone who has even a glimmer of technical knowledge (supposedly everyone on this forum) could tell you how impossible that is on a shared network.

It is not the job of the consumer to second guess the promises advertised based upon whether or not it is possible. They could, indeed, guarantee traffic levels by customer using current technology. The consumer should not have to investigate how many people are on their same local net, nor should they be disconnected for trying to actually use the service as advertised. In case you didn't notice, Comcast sells to people who are not Slashdot readers and who do not have any expertise.

*Especially using a protocol like P2P.

Please note, P2P is not a protocol, it is a type of protocol. There are a large variety of them.

Save the Internet did this already. Re:Finally

[Erris]

People who don't know Vuse should be familiar with the members of "Save the Internet" which launched a similar pettition two weeks ago. No one but ATT wants anything but a neutral network.

The network is yours. Re:Finally

[Erris]

it sounds like you're taking the position that the federal government should have the authority to regulate how networks work. I think that's awful, and endangers just about everyone.

There is nothing new about government regulation of networks. Intentionally blocking competitors on networks is already against the law and has it's roots in common carriage laws that are a hundred years old.

Overall, I'm with you and think it would be great if networks were free. Everything will be cheaper and easier when there are no more broadcast monopolies and other anti-competitive regulations that restrict use of the airwaves or public servitude. Telcoms, broadcast and media companies would be bankrupt in less than a year and all of us would be that much richer. The current cable and wireless monopolies are not natural, they are protected by corruption.

Even in that world, the public nature of networks would require neutrality laws. Networks are public places that only have value when people use them. Without the public, they are worthless. Blocking competitors is worse than bad business, it's immoral and insults the public. The public should protect itself from that kind of criminal behavior the same way it protects itself from other acts of racketeering and vandalism.

Peering

[raidfibre]

I would like to propose for a minute that if everyone has faster connections, and everyone uses p2p protocols to transfer some of their content, that bandwidth peering will go up, and ISPs won't really have to pay a lot more for the OC48s. I realize that a lot of that is in upkeep/exotic hardware.

I guess what I'm saying is that this is a possibility, and a study should be done to see what the REAL effect of p2p is. If I'm connected to 10 other people in the Boston area on Comcast's network, would I REALLY be costing Comcast more money in bandwidth, aside from the fact that I'm using a lot of "last mile" throughput (which yes, I know, costs money to maintain).

--
I reserve the right to be completely wrong *shrug*

New Linux ISOs

[FudRucker]

when popular Linux distros get released there is no way in hell the servers can keep up with users wanting the new distro that just got released, and BitTorrent is the only way to get a copy, not all BitTorrent users are downloading music & video. and not all music & video is copywrite infringement, and how dare the ISPs tell customers how they use the bandwidth they are paying for!!!

i hope the FCC accepts and enforces this petition...

Re:New Linux ISOs

[cdrguru]

How dare they indeed. Except you aren't paying for raw "bandwidth", you are paying for a service that the ISP is providing. The terms of that service and what it consists of are not clearly defined. Nowhere does it say that specific protocols, transports and applications are either allowed or disallowed.

Pretty much, you bought a pig in a poke.

The Solution: Require Full Disclosure

[dalesun]

The only practical solution is to require providers to fully disclose any bandwidth shaping or similar throttling, and regulate the application of such limits to existing accounts.

Such limited service should never be sold as unlimited Internet access. Clear terms, such as limited, shaped or controlled, should be required. Limits should not be added to existing accounts without providing adequate notice of at least 60 days.

Trying to prohibit any type of throttling is a losing proposition that invites many arguments against it; and such legislation would be very difficult to pass. Regulating how networks are managed and Quality of Service is maintained just isn't practical. But it's easy to require any routine application throttling or traffic shaping to be fully disclosed. An informed customer is unlikely to choose such a limited service; it's unlikely they would even be offered.

Speak.to is about communication

Re:The Solution: Require Full Disclosure

[PhantomHarlock]

I like the idea of disclosure. Let em do whatever they want, they just have to tell you in a straightforward way. Doesn't solve the problem, but puts it in the spotlight. A good start...

packet masquerading

[davidwr]

If ssh packets are legally exempt from intentional delays, guess what protocol high-bandwidth users will disguise their packets as?

Re:packet masquerading

[Shakrai]

If ssh packets are legally exempt from intentional delays, guess what protocol high-bandwidth users will disguise their packets as?

*shrug*, you missed the point.

A) Under a properly designed traffic shaping scheme there is no such thing as an "intentional delay". They might be delayed if the pipe is maxed out and something else (voip/ssh/etc) needs it. There's a world of difference between this and intentionally interfering with and/or slowing down p2p protocols. Also, no p2p user is going to notice any slowdown caused by prioritizing ssh or voip, because neither one of them uses that much bandwidth compared to p2p.

B) Deep packet inspection would be able to tell the difference between actual ssh and just randomly encrypted data. Fire up wireshark if you don't believe me. It easily decodes ssh requests and responses. I suppose the p2p protocols could actually go so far as to adopt the ssh protocol and mask their traffic that way -- but this hasn't happened yet in any of the mainstream p2p protocols that I'm aware of and there are other ways around it. The only ssh packets that I prioritize on my network are those

Next you'll say that the p2p application will just set it's MTU to a really small number. All the power to them, because this will slow their transfers down with IP and TCP overhead more then any traffic shaping would.

Besides which, I don't think the goal of most p2p users is to monopolize their pipes. The goal is to get a decent amount of performance. Most people aren't going to get upset if their neighbors WoW or VoIP packets move ahead of their bittorrent packets in the queue during times when the pipe is maxed out. They are going to get upset if you take measures to slow them down/actively interfere with them regardless of how low or high the network utilization is.

Re:packet masquerading

[Shakrai]

-- but this hasn't happened yet in any of the mainstream p2p protocols that I'm aware of and there are other ways around it. The only ssh packets that I prioritize on my network are those

..... under 200 bytes in size, otherwise scp transfers get priority and kill my other interactive (other ssh sessions, telnet, voip, etc) stuff.

Blah, used the < symbol and forgot to encode it for html ;)

It wouldn't work

[tkrotchko]

It wouldn't work, simply because in many parts of the country, there is a competitive landscape.

If Comcast said "10G/Month for $40", then Verizon could say "yeah, well, 20G/month for $40". To which Verizon would be forced to say "Okay, unlimited", and then they're back where they started except now they actually have promised unlimited.

And even if they promised 10G/Month, I'm guessing a huge part of their customers are lucky to download 1G/month. These people are the goofballs who get high speed internet to shop at Coldwater Creek and check their email. They could get by with dial-up, but it's less sexy. Comcast (and others) love these customers because they're pure profit. But if you promised 10G/month, then you *actually have to have the capacity to support 10G/month for all your customers*. I doubt they do!

So any way you look at it, they're better off, grudgingly supporting "unlimited", hoping you use 1G per month, and cutting you off if you hit some special, double-secret cap.

Re:It wouldn't work

[Paradigm_Complex]

Wait, capitalism wouldn't work because of competition? Pulled some crazy double-logic there. This is exactly why Comcast (and everyone else) should be forced to simply charge what they have too to deliver what they promise, or promise less. If someone else (e.g. Verizon) can do it better for less, consumers win.

What's the fuss?

[Reluctant Wizard]

Sorry to be the wet blanket here, but this is cut-and-pasted directly from Comcast's AUP: (snip) Prohibited Uses and Activities Prohibited uses include, but are not limited to, using the Service, Customer Equipment, or the Comcast Equipment to: run programs, equipment, or servers from the Premises that provide network content or any other services to anyone outside of your Premises LAN (Local Area Network), also commonly referred to as public services or servers. Examples of prohibited services and servers include, but are not limited to, e-mail, Web hosting, file sharing, and proxy services and servers; ... if the Service is used in a way that Comcast or its suppliers, in their sole discretion, believe violate this AUP, Comcast or its suppliers may take any responsive actions they deem appropriate. These actions include, but are not limited to, temporary or permanent removal of content, cancellation of newsgroup posts, filtering of Internet transmissions, and the immediate suspension or termination of all or any portion of the Service. Neither Comcast nor its affiliates, suppliers, or agents will have any liability for any these responsive actions. These actions are not Comcast's exclusive remedies and Comcast may take any other legal or technical action it deems appropriate. (snip) Now, any of you with any shred of honesty has to admit that in function, your P2P torrent client is also a server, and that falls under this prohibition. Doesn't matter if you're DL'ing Shrek3, Debbie Does Dallas, or the latest Debian distro -- the program is still a server, and Comcast has already told all of its subscribers what they may do (read the part about "filtering of Internet transmissions...may take any other legal or technical action..."). Don't like it? Unfortunately you agreed to it when you signed up for service. How can this be fraud, when they told you up front they might take this type of action? Unhappy now? Vote with your feet and your wallet, otherwise realize that they own the ball field, the bases, the bat, balls and gloves -- you want to play the game, you have to play by their rules. Like I said, I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but I'm just a messenger.

Re:What's the fuss?

[Reluctant Wizard]

Wow, sorry for the run-together formatting. The preview had it laid out in paragraphs, and I thought it would post that way.

Exactly.

[SanityInAnarchy]

I would much rather have my ISP do no filtering. I can filter VoIP stuff myself, if I want to.

If there's congestion, they need to move to a metered model and start charging more. Then, either people will stop using so damned much bandwidth on BitTorrent, or the ISP will be able to actually build the infrastructure to support it.

The "need" for filtering/shaping at the ISP level is a complete and utter myth.

Re:Exactly.

[cheater512]

You get what you pay for.

I pay $80 AUD/month for 512k unlimited.
Thats true unlimited with no shaping of any kind.

Also the ISP is a good one and likes giving out bandwidth liberally on its other plans.
Their backbone is top notch consequently.

Why should you get special treatment?

[davidwr]

If you are a small-volume user and you need to upload a 1MB file right now, and 100 neighbors who are also small volume users decide today is the day they want to download a short 1MB video by torrent, and by coincidence you all start at the same time, why should you get any preference?

The solution to bandwidth hogs is to make them pay for what they are using. Instead of charging $50/month for "all you can eat" 6Mbps Internet, charge $60 for what 90-95% of users use in a month at that speed. Charge $120/month for double that monthly quota, $180 for triple, and so on. Once you reach your quota, you drop down to a minimal speed, probably 2x dialup or something like that.

Between the invisible hand of the marketplace causing some 24/7 torrent-traders to cut back and the extra money your cable company has from the rest to spend on beefing up its infrastructure, it's a win for you.

Another solution is for customers to pay a reduced rate for "curtailment without notice" service, where their per-second speed would be throttled way down in favor of "1st class" customers during periods of congestion.

I can also see a hybrid system, with 3 billing rates:
1st class all the time
1st class until I use SMALLNUM GB/month then 2nd class
2nd class all the time

Some ISPs may opt to only offer the middle grade of service.

Re:Someone with gimmee, ... maybe

[u-235-sentinel]

Which once again goes back to my "it's all in your head" comment. Comcast didn't make such promises and even if they did? Anyone who has even a glimmer of technical knowledge (supposedly everyone on this forum) could tell you how impossible that is on a shared network.* I can only conclude that in the face of such a fact that those repeating it hope that constant usage will make it come true.

Huh?

I do it all the time. It's called QoS.

Perhaps Comcast should hire somebody who knows how to use it :D

Who decides what a company should sell?

[KWTm]

You raise excellent questions.

A company shouldn't be able to unilaterally decide what product or service it is going to sell?

Not if it is a local monopoly.

What is this frikin North Korea?

No.

Who should decide what the company is going to offer then?

In general, the people, through their elected representatives and the laws created on behalf of the people. Specifically in this case, I would agree that if there were competition among the network providers and if some other company could say, "We will use the publicly available cables to provide a competing service," then the companies involved should no longer have the legal obligations usually associated with a monopoly.

President Bush?

No, not by himself, anyway.

The Supreme Court?

They might be indirectly involved, but they would not make the day-to-day decisions.

Based on what does anyone other than the company have any right to make that determination?

Based on the lack of competition due to the carrier company (in this case, Comcast) having exclusive control over the cables, and the near-impossible startup costs for another company to come in to compete. While Comcast may not be officially classified as a monopoly, it is a de-facto monopoly in most of its markets (similar to the way Microsoft was determined by the Supreme Court --answering your question about the Supreme Court-- to be effectively a monopoly despite existence of minor competition).
Similarly, while access to the Internet may not be officially classified as an essential service, its importance in our everyday lives is well known, to the extent that disaster shelters in the Southern California fires have set up Internet access.
I think the agency involved in this case would be the FCC. I wonder if the FTC might be involved --aren't they the ones who get involved in monopoly regulation?
In summary, a company's "right" to compete is balanced by its clients' "right" to to choose that company. Comcast is effectively a local monopoly on an essential service, a situation that should come with restrictions for the protection of the people.

Not profitable without a monopoly

[KWTm]

Perhaps there's less competition because residential internet is not profitable without a monopoly?

Correct: having a monopoly is more profitable. There are other examples where agencies are government run because it would make sense to have a "monopoly" --say, having only one police force for one jurisdiction.

At the same time, explaining why a monopoly is better for the given circumstances does not remove the fact that it is indeed a monopoly, and that this imposes extra ethical obligations to the general public, which are codified in the laws regarding monopoly. Slashdot has had many discussions on Microsoft's monopoly, so I won't rehash them here, but the gist is that a company can enjoy its monopoly status, and its clients enjoy its services, with some sensible regulation. When that company oversteps its bounds to the detriment of the people, then something needs to be done.

Fair trade, or price point exploitation?

[lpq]

In theory, I agree with much of what you say -- up to a point.

If the "tubes" are full, one needs a way to prioritize traffic.

BUT, there are some exceptions and questions:

1) Why are the tubes full? Weren't telecom companies given billions of dollars SPECIFICALLYto expand coverage and upgrade capacity? Isn't it true that all of that money was taken and used by the companies, yet there was no measurable increase in coverage or speed to show where the money went?

If telecom companies are given money to upgrade bandwidth, and instead, they upgrade their profit margins and stock value, should they be given free reign to now charge customers "extra" for providing the services that the government (US public) already paid for? How many times do we need to pay for the capital upgrades?

2) Often, the companies that engage in rate-limiting, or auto-termination of streams do so to increase their bottom line without having to spend money in R&D. Do we need to go back to stricter regulation of those who own local infrastructure (probably), to guarantee that some percentage of the money is being wisely "managed" and used in infrastructure upgrades?

I don't know how long it has been going on (maybe forever), but I, personally, noticed it more starting in the 90's: When there was an oversupply of cash and returns were good, companies took those monies and churned them into "profit" -- and *instead* of investing in research, companies (I first noticed it with Sony, but they are not the only guilty parties) invested in "Partitioning available resources and products to create more "grades of service or product" to more effectively extract maximum money from the consumer while providing no increase in value. Instead, companies provide " Negative decreases in functionality".

This is not like computer science where a double negative = a positive; negative decrease != increase. The company designs a high level model, say a "1000 series". The price for the product, as designed, is aimed at $1000 (or Euro, Pound, etc) price point. Their incremental cost for producing each successive unit is $150 (for example). Like disk-drive manufacturer practice of releasing multiple capacities of a drive that have the same internal capacity, but only show "diminished" capacity when bought as a smaller drive. Some drive manufacturers, sell a 100GB model -- say 1 platter. Well, they'll also sell the same drive for 80GB, 60GB and 40GB drives -- just formatted differently with the firmware enforcing the capacity. I remember one manufacturer selling a 40GB, where if you removed a jumper it became a 100-200GB drive. They needed the 40GB to sell into lower price niches or provide replacements for older model disks under warranty.

The bottom line to the consumer -- they don't get any better hardware or product for the higher price product -- it's just the the lower priced products are programmed down in features.

It is the same in the telecom & network provider industry. The provider may have access to 5-10x the capacity, if they wanted to activate all of their "dark fiber". The fiber and connections are already there -- they just have to flip a switch to activate them. But by keeping a large fraction "dark", they artificially decrease supply to convince consumers and regulators that they need more money to provide better service -- all the while keeping 30-90% of their real capacity "off line".

They tell consumers (and federal regulating agencies), that they are operating at capacity. But it is disingenuous. It's the capacity of what they have enabled, but not what what is possible with the currently installed infrastructure.

This is why America doesn't have as much innovation anymore as other countries. In America, prices are set to extract the most money from everyone unrelated to costs to provide those services. The consumer is "ripped off". Rather than telling the consumer (say with "disks"), 1st 500GB platte

Vuse should pay for the bandwidth it uses

[Brett Glass]

I'm going to be a bit blunt here, but I think that what I'm going to say is well-deserved and is certainly backed up by the facts. It appears that Vuze has based its business plan on not buying sufficient bandwidth to deliver its products and then taking the bandwidth from the ISPs of its customers. It states as much in its petition to the FCC, where it writes: "Torrent technologies make use of resources -- bandwidth, storage, and processing power -- on a decentralized basis, allowing large data transfers to be made more efficiently and cost-effectively than ever before. Torrent technologies leverage the power of many individual computers by enabling each computer interested in a piece of content to obtain small pieces of it from multiple other computers, and simultaneously play the same role to others who seek the same content in the future. "Accordingly, a distributor of content need not have many large central servers to store and send a file each time an Internet user is interested in a particular piece of content; instead, the content distributor need only have a handful of servers that operate as initial "seed servers" for the content, and can then rely on the distributed computing capacity of all of the individual user computers (the "swarm") that have that have agreed to be used as a "seed" for others." In the above, it also glosses over the fact that its software turns users' computers into servers, violating -- in the overwhelming majority of cases -- the ISP's terms of service. Vuze then goes on to misrepresent the characteristics of the BitTorrent protocol: "For both downloading and uploading content, torrent technology uses fewer resources than traditional non-P2P protocols such as HTTP because distributed computing permits uploads and downloads to be resumed mid-way rather than restarted, and transmission errors can easily be fixed without resending an entire file." The fact is that BitTorrent is not more efficient than HTTP or FTP. It is sometimes faster, but to attain this speed it consumes more resources than a simple file transfer. In fact, because one must transmit as much as one receives, it at least doubles the use of the ISP's backbone resources and of the user's allocated bandwidth. What's more, due to the lack of caching, it is many times less efficient because the same file must be sent many times across the Internet backbone instead of once. And the assertion, above, that downloads cannot be resumed is flat wrong. Virtually all FTP clients now provide means by which to resume interrupted downloads (which are rare in any case). And because HTTP can be cached, even an HTTP download which is restarted from scratch does not consume additional backbone resources because the cache will have received the entire file and can retransmit it to the end user. Again, it appears that Vuze is so unwilling to "pay its freight" to deliver content to customers that it is willing to file a deceptive -- and, in some places, patently false -- petition with the FCC. Such tactics, in my opinion, deserve no sympathy. --Brett Glass, LARIAT.NET

Re:Vuse should pay for the bandwidth it uses

[Brett Glass]

Oops.... The above was badly formatted because Slashdot ran the lines together. My bad; I should have previewed. here's the message as I meant it to be displayed:

I'm going to be a bit blunt here, but I think that what I'm going to say is well-deserved and is certainly backed up by the facts. It appears that Vuze has based its business plan on not buying sufficient bandwidth to deliver its products and then taking the bandwidth from the ISPs of its customers. It states as much in its petition to the FCC, where it writes:

"Torrent technologies make use of resources -- bandwidth, storage, and processing power -- on a decentralized basis, allowing large data transfers to be made more efficiently and cost-effectively than ever before. Torrent technologies leverage the power of many individual computers by enabling each computer interested in a piece of content to obtain small pieces of it from multiple other computers, and simultaneously play the same role to others who seek the same content in the future.

"Accordingly, a distributor of content need not have many large central servers to store and send a file each time an Internet user is interested in a particular piece of content; instead, the content distributor need only have a handful of servers that operate as initial "seed servers" for the content, and can then rely on the distributed computing capacity of all of the individual user computers (the "swarm") that have that have agreed to be used as a "seed" for others."

In the above, it also glosses over the fact that its software turns users' computers into servers, violating -- in the overwhelming majority of cases -- the ISP's terms of service.

Vuze then goes on to misrepresent the characteristics of the BitTorrent protocol:

"For both downloading and uploading content, torrent technology uses fewer resources than traditional non-P2P protocols such as HTTP because distributed computing permits uploads and downloads to be resumed mid-way rather than restarted, and transmission errors can easily be fixed without resending an entire file."

The fact is that BitTorrent is not more efficient than HTTP or FTP. It is sometimes faster, but to attain this speed it consumes more resources than a simple file transfer. In fact, because one must transmit as much as one receives, it at least doubles the use of the ISP's backbone resources and of the user's allocated bandwidth. What's more, due to the lack of caching, it is many times less efficient because the same file must be sent many times across the Internet backbone instead of once. And the assertion, above, that downloads cannot be resumed is flat wrong. Virtually all FTP clients now provide means by which to resume interrupted downloads (which are rare in any case). And because HTTP can be cached, even an HTTP download which is restarted from scratch does not consume additional backbone resources because the cache will have received the entire file and can retransmit it to the end user.

Again, it appears that Vuze is so unwilling to "pay its freight" to deliver content to customers that it is willing to file a deceptive -- and, in some places, patently false -- petition with the FCC. Such tactics, in my opinion, deserve no sympathy.

--Brett Glass, LARIAT.NET